Looking Ahead... November 2-13

Important Dates:

• November 3-6 Book Fair
• November 3 & 4 Parent-Teacher Conferences
• November 13 Cowboy/Cowgirl Day
• November 25-27 Thanksgiving Break 

Reading:

This week we will finish our character unit and our current read aloud, Because of Winn Dixie. The kids have loved this book and this unit. They have done a great job noticing things about the characters in their books, and keeping track of it in their reading response journals. We will celebrate and wrap up this unit by watching the movie Because of Winn Dixie and making "trading cards" for the main characters in our books. The following week we will begin our next unit on series. Students will be encouraged to decide on a series of books to read along side their reading partners. Our classroom read aloud series will be Amber Brown.

Writing:

We are on a roll writing our second personal narratives. We are spending many days revising our stories to make them better. We added in action and sensory details. This week we add in dialogue and learn how to correctly punctuate it. We will spend an entire writing time editing our piece to make sure we have capitals at the beginning and punctuation at the end of all of our sentences. As we begin to publish this piece, students will learn how to break their piece apart into paragraphs. 

Grammar/Spelling:

We are continuing to roll along with grammar. Each week we focus on a new sentence. We label nouns, adjectives, verbs, etc. We also revise the sentences and write our own sentences using the mentor sentence as our guide. 
Spelling list 6 is coming home today. This week we are focusing on words that end with a silent e and homophones. We will make a book of popular homophones together as a class. 

Math:

We are rolling right along with multiplication. We spend a lot of time in class practicing their fact fluency. Please help them practice their facts at home as well. It will be so beneficial to them to have their facts memorized as we move into word problems. This week we will begin by solving one step word problems, and then move into solving two step word problems.   

Science:

We have wrapped up our first social studies unit on geography and those tests came home Thursday. We are now switching gears to science. Our next two units will be light and sound. This is always a favorite of third graders because it comes with many fun experiments. 

Other News:

• P.E.  C.A.R.E.S. Food Drive -  This will begin November 2 and run through November 20. Suggestions for third grade to donate are fruits, vegetables, and toiletries. However, all food donations will be excepted. This is a competition between all the classes. The class that brings in the highest number of items will win a t-shirt and a bowling trip to Hudsonville Lanes. Thanks for helping to support the community.